Industry News

New-home sales on soft slide

November 26, 2002

Feds survey finds pace steady at 1 million units

Inman News Features

Sales of new single-family houses in October were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.007 million units, two federal agencies said today. That figure was compared with a revised September rate of 1.054 million houses and an October 2001 estimate of 865,000 houses.

The estimates were released jointly by the U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The median sales price of new houses sold in October 2002 was $176,700 and the average sales price was $225,100. The seasonally adjusted estimate of the number of new houses on the market at the end of October was 335,000, a 4.1 months' supply at the current pace of sales.

These statistics are estimated from sample surveys of houses selected from building permits and are subject to sampling variability and such nonsampling errors as bias and variance from response, nonreporting and undercoverage, according to the agencies. Changes in seasonally adjusted statistics often show irregular movement, and it typical takes five months to establish a trend for new houses sold, also according to the agencies. A "sale" is defined as a deposit taken or sales agreement signed.